SquareMeal Review of La Cabina

Bronze Award

Unless you’re in the know, it can be tricky to find restaurants and bars in the capital that stay open particularly late, but with the forthcoming night tube and places like La Cabina, changes are afoot: this tapas bar keeps on cooking until 5am from Thursday to Saturday. Formerly Manero’s, the basement dining room can be reached from a (hopefully cleaner-than-your-average) phone box on Kingsland Road. When booking, diners are given a code which is punched in to the telephone, at which point the back panel of the booth (hopefully) swings open to reveal La Cabina’s entrance. The menu runs the Spanish gamut from acorn-fed Ibérico ham and red wine-roasted chorizo to cured meat selections, before taking a detour to Britain via ham hock and piccalilli or haggis Scotch eggs. This selection is the work of Javier Vincente, the man behind Tooting hotspot The Little Taperia. All very snacky and all very boozy, thanks to cocktails, wines, draught beers – and the guarantee of drinks until dawn.